Over 130 people were led away and ticketed by police in Chicago as thousands of teachers, parents and students protested against a decision to close 54 public schools. Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel has refused further negotiations, apparently making the closings a done deal.

CTU President Karen Lewis was cheered when she took the microphone at Daley Plaza late Wednesday afternoon and repeated her argument that the Chicago Public Schools' decision to close schools with predominantly African-American enrollments is racist.

"Let's not pretend that when you close schools on the South and West sides, the children affected aren't black," Lewis said. "Let's not pretend that's not racist."

In an event rife with political symbolism, the size of the crowd was anybody's guess. The official police estimate was 700 to 900 people, according to the department's news affairs office. A CTU spokeswoman said the union was "appalled" by the department's number, saying between 5,000 and 6,500 were on hand.

Those at the protest were loud but disciplined, sticking to a script the CTU provided earlier in the day in a news release. Most of the vitriol was aimed at Emanuel, with protesters carrying signs included "Rahm's brain is underutilized" and "School Closings = One Term Mayor."

127 protesters were led away peacefully by police after sitting in the street at the intersection of Washington and LaSalle outside City Hall. Their hands were behind their backs, but not handcuffed. Despite earlier warnings from CTU that the protesters would "risk arrest," police made a point of noting that 127 people were issued tickets on site, and not arrested.

The district says that the 54 schools slated for closure are "underenrolled," and need to be shut to deal with a $1 billion dollar deficit.

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The 10th Amendment states, “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

Supporters of states’ rights argue that the 10th Amendment grants the states more power than the federal government, because if it isn’t a power granted by the Constitution to the federal government, it is a power of the state.

But the U.S. Supreme Court routinely has rejected states’ claims that the federal government has overstepped its bounds and violated the 10th Amendment.

In Printz v. United States, the Supreme Court said that state agencies did not have to perform federally mandated background checks of individuals trying to purchase a handgun, but since the background checks were federal law, federal agencies were allowed to conduct background checks. Essentially the ruling says that states don’t have to participate in federal laws, but they can’t prevent federal agencies from enforcing those laws.

The concept of nullification is based on 'interposition,' wherein the state determines it has the 'right' to interpose itself to block or ignore federal laws it considers unconstitutional. However, Article III of that very constitution grants the federal judiciary SOLE authority to interpret the constitution. The concept of nullification has never been legally upheld. Perhaps the Rev might restrict himself to misinterpreting the Bible rather than the law.

Orwell is rollin' in his grave. The doublespeak in that speech is so deep it would take an interpreter two weeks to figure it all out. Orwell could do it in 1 reading and know exactly how fucked we are.